16 August 2010

Return to Isivinini (Ziggy) slope mountain

I must confess to gaining a whole new respect for these Windguru type wind forecasting systems, having always regarded Kzn coastal sloping as totally opportunistic and bereft of any planning by weather. Johan Moelich'ssms surprised me Saturday and a quick look online confirmed a Sunday SW blow on the way, certainly not apparent from the Saturday weather. I suspect this sms system also explains the recent popularity of the Winston SW slope, given that we seem to be be starved of decent weekend NE blows, of late. After me panicking over my own quite correct directions and going astray for a while, we arrived at the top in sunny and pleasant weather. Again, the wind still top deck made the first launches a bit tentative but all were soon having a great time and Will even found a DS spot to one side - the speeds were quite amazing and how the plane stands the loads even more so. Johan explored another route via the dam road on the way home and found it is indeed shorter for the Hillcrest folk to travel that way. Russ's homework revealed that the locals call the mountain "Isivinni" (big blow).

I believe this will remain a "day trip" group outing slope, with most of the Hillcrest folk still preferring the convenience of the short distance to Winston for sport flying. Well worth the effort though!